Three school districts joined together with Butler Tech to put real-world learning into practice at an event known as Project Chaos. Approximately 100 students from Lakota, Loveland, Middletown and Butler Tech worked together to offer solutions on how best to solve the problem of making transportation available to everyone.

Over the three-day experience, students from Lakota’s Career Readiness Academy (CRA) collaborated with students from the other districts at the Procter and Gamble GYM and Butler Tech’s School of the Arts. CRA teacher Lisa Kiesewetter was enthusiastic about the experience. “Being able to participate at the P&G Gym environment, and out of their normal element provided an opportunity to build collaboration skills,” she said. Kiesewetter went on to explain that the students were grouped by the color of their Project Chaos t-shirts they received on the first day, which further encouraged collaboration among the districts.

Isaiah Erickson was happy to be a part of the event. “It was a good learning experience because it was different than regular school,” he said. He also values the personal lessons he learned. “One thing I did was learn to work with strangers, find my voice and explore leadership skills that I didn’t know I had.”

The students worked together to come up with ideas on how to better provide transportation to people in lower income brackets in order to ensure job security. Ideas ranged from solar powered vehicles that would not require money for gas to companies matching what employees pay for gas prices or car services such as Uber. Company policy was also brought up, with students suggesting that policies supporting employees with transportation issues be created.

Participants were introduced to the challenge through a video presentation and speakers. One presenter shared statistics about the number of children who die every year because their parents are unable to provide transportation to hospitals. Stunned by this, Alina Koenig began brainstorming ideas for traveling doctors to visit patients at their homes. “There are issues you don’t think about,” she said. “Talking about them makes you realize how big they can be.”

Groups of eight to 10 students worked together to brainstorm ideas, with each person having a role. All ideas were supported, with students asking the question “how might we” to encourage thoughts and ideas. Lindsay Williams saw value in working with new people. “It was really nice to see how everyone came together even though we’re different - to come together and learn and put our minds all together as one and work together even though a lot of us are from a lot of different walks of life.”